Share my excitement and my discoveries as I delve ever deeper into the world of prints and printmakers

Friday, August 30, 2013

Augusto Cernigoj - Movimento Arte Concreta

Augusto (or Avgust) Černigoj was born in Trieste in 1898, of Slovenian parentage. He studied at the Fine Art Academy of Bologna, and also at the Bauhaus, where he was the only Italian student. Augusto Černigoj worked as a teacher at the Slovenian school in Trieste. The two works below were contributed to Documenti d'arte d'oggi, the journal of the Movimento Arte Concreta, in 1958. By happenstance, my copies have been hand-signed by Černigoj in pen at the bottom right. Usual copies are unsigned.

Augusto Černigoj

Untitled woodcut, 1958

Augusto Černigoj

Untitled lithograph, 1958

The influence of Hans Arp can be seen in the lithograph, which is a very successful and balanced composition, in my view. Although he was a well-respected artist, the art of Černigoj has only been truly appreciated after his death in 1985. More than 1400 pieces are gathered in the Galleria di Avgust Černigoj in Lipizza.

4 comments:

Hello Neil, I have, coincidentally, just come back from Slovenia myself, so I have only now found your flurry of posts about the Movimenta Arte Concreta. As always, I learn so much when I read your blog! Thank you.

Hi Nancy - Hope Slovenia was fun - I've only been there once, when my father was hospitalised while on holiday, so the trip was a bit fraught! One or two more posts still to come on MAC before I get back to my more usual territory (with hopes as always of keeping up a slightly more regular supply!).

I really like the first of these two woodcuts. When you click on the image to blow it up slightly, it looks more relaxed and has a more balanced, harmonious feel than it has at the small size one sees when reading the blog. I'm always fascinated by the way images (and the pages of books) seem to change when reproduced at different sizes.

Phil, I often wish I could somehow put images on here that would magically expand to their true size. Maybe it's possible, but certainly beyond me. Funnily enough, the original blog format when I started seemed much more satisfactory to me - when you clicked on an image, you got a big version of it, whereas now you get a slideshow, with a background colour that interferes with the image.